TITLE: The Third Day NAME: Claire Amundsen Schaeffer COUNTRY: USA EMAIL: webmaster@freegraphics.com WEBPAGE: http://www.wockyjivvy.com/art/ TOPIC: Gardens COPYRIGHT: I SUBMIT TO THE STANDARD RAYTRACING COMPETITION COPYRIGHT. JPGFILE: cas3day.jpg ZIPFILE: cas3day.zip RENDERER USED: Povray 3.1 TOOLS USED: Moray, Paintshop Pro (adding signature) RENDER TIME: 8.5 hours HARDWARE USED: Celeron, 500 mhz IMAGE DESCRIPTION: In contrast to my previous attempts at photo-realism (e.g., http://www.wockyjivvy.com/art/20years.html -- 212K), I've been experimenting of late with using Povray to create abstract art. The swoops and curves I've discovered in these experiments seem particularly organic and the perfect basis for a garden. DESCRIPTION OF HOW THIS IMAGE WAS CREATED: This entire scene is shot with all objects (including lights and camera) inside a highly reflective and hollow sphere. Other than lights and the camera, there are 15 "objects" inside the sphere -- eight of them in front of the camera, 7 behind the camera (such as the "sky ball" which is not seen, but reflections of it are). When working in such a reflective world, the placement of objects is critical... I find trial and error to be the best determinant for where each piece (especially the camera) should be placed. It's time consuming indeed -- especially when you consider that moving one object doesn't effect just that object. It also effects all of the reflections of that object (which make up the majority of an image such as this one). Early in the process, I do traces with the highly reflective outer ball as is, but all the interior pieces in different solid colors -- that allows me to see which piece is causing which reflections and to know that while I may not like the particular placement of one sphere, if I move it, I lose three beautiful swoops that are actually reflections of that sphere. As I said, trial and error. The source files for this image were much too large to include, but I have submitted a severely stripped down scene which demonstrates the basic method for making this image. The title is a reference to the creation story found in the book of Genesis (wherein all plant life is created on the third day in a series of creations). The "blue-sky" texture is a modification of one of the standard pov "sky textures".